Eurofighter companies land new support deals worth over $1.4bn

A team led by Alenia Aeronautica has secured new business worth over €600 million ($890 million) to provide in-service support for the Italian air force’s fleet of Eurofighter combat aircraft.

According to the four-nation Eurofighter industry consortium, which signed the integrated supply chain management service deal with the NATO Eurofighter and Tornado Management Agency, the new arrangement “will sustain the high operational availability shown by the Typhoon fleet in Italy”, and produce “substantial cost savings”.

The deal will see industry take the lead in providing in-service support at the Italian air force’s Gioia del Colle and Grosseto operating bases, and at its logistics centre at Cameri air base over an initial period of five years. Alenia Aeronautica will be supported by Elettronica, Selex Communications and Selex Galileo in performing the work. Similar to the support structure recently contracted with BAE Systems for the UK Royal Air Force’s Typhoons, the new measure is intended to contribute to a requested 50% reduction in through-life costs being sought by Eurofighter partner nations Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK.

“This contract is the best example of the commitment from Eurofighter to answer the customer request for a new concept of technical support,” says consortium chief executive Enzo Casolini.

Separately, BAE has signed deals worth over £350 million ($576 million) with the EuroDASS and Euroradar consortia, respectively to support the Praetorian defensive aids subsystem and Captor fire control radar which equip Eurofighters for the four launch nations. To run until mid-2014, the deals should lead to “a reduced cost of ownership and increased aircraft availability”.

Companies involved in the EuroDASS and Euroradar organisations are EADS, Elettronica, Indra and Selex Galileo.